


Perpendiculars

by Laura Kaye (laurakaye)



Series: Special Topics in the Geometry of Group Actions [2]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Comfort Sex, Fix-It, Friends With Benefits, Friendship, M/M, Old Friends, sassy spy buddies, unrequited Harry Hart/Eggsy Unwin, unrequited Phil Coulson/Clint Barton
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-05
Updated: 2015-08-05
Packaged: 2018-04-13 02:16:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,915
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4504002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laurakaye/pseuds/Laura%20Kaye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spies learn early to come to terms with death. Coming to terms with not being dead is a bit more complicated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perpendiculars

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much to everyone who read Parallels! This story is part 2 of 3.
> 
> A million thanks to Kathar, Schuyler, and girlwhoisclumsy for beta!

Harry Hart had regained consciousness in a large number of unfortunate situations over the course of his long and colorful career, so perhaps this particular occasion—waking up, after being quite sure one was dead, and being greeted by the sight of another dead man—should not have thrown him quite as much as it did.

“Shit,” he said, or rather, croaked, and the man he knew as Control Delta looked up from his tablet in concern.

“Don’t try to talk, Galahad, you’ve just been extubated,” he said. “Here, would you like some ice chips?”

Harry glared—he’d like some _intel_ , thank you very much, and Delta knew it, but he supposed the ice chips were a necessary prerequisite. He considered the possibility that Delta was some sort of plant, or possibly Hydra—they’d had a very bad case of that in SHIELD—but almost immediately discarded the idea. If one were going to try to compromise Harry, there were many better people to impersonate than an old friend and sporadic lover whose real name he’d only learned from his (apparently false) obituary.

Delta—who was capped and gowned and gloved, they must have been worried about infection—had picked up a styrofoam cup from the bedside and was holding a plastic spoon of ice chips to Harry’s mouth. Harry didn’t even try to take the spoon, the leaden weakness in his body warning him off moving his arms just yet, but opened his mouth and accepted the ice. His throat relaxed as cold water soothed the tissue.

“I refuse to entertain the possibility that there’s some sort of espionage Valhalla,” he rasped, “so I would appreciate some information, if you please, and no fucking about. Also, take that mask off, you look ridiculous.”

Delta smiled at him, tired eyes crinkling pleasantly at the corners above his mask. “Your language processing seems to be all right, at least,” he said, taking off the mask with a shrug. “Medical will be happy to hear that, they’ve worked very hard on the restoration treatments.” He pulled a chair over next to Harry’s bedside and pulled something up on his tablet. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

 _Eggsy,_ he thought immediately, and the memories came thick and fast. A thrill of possessive pride when he picked one of his own ties to go with Eggsy’s suit; the flash of dimples as he’d taught him to mix a martini; the wave of warm contentment as Eggsy sat, sleep-rumpled at his table, eating bacon; the flood of rage and loss when he’d heard about the final test and Eggsy’s subsequent flight. He’d had plans for them, plans that depended upon Eggsy becoming a Kingsman, Harry’s equal, an appropriate person to…

Harry tightened his jaw. None of that was relevant just now. “I had a mission,” he said. He regarded his surroundings with skepticism; he appeared to be in a hospital room inside some sort of bunker. “I take it things didn’t go according to plan.”

“I’m gonna take a wild guess here and say ‘no,’” Delta said. “Unless you guys are now able to weaponize coma patients. Which would admittedly be useful,” he added thoughtfully, “but also really disturbing.”

Harry groaned. “Coma, really? Shit, Delta, that’s the second time this year,” he complained.

“Believe me, as a fellow former dead guy, I’m sympathetic,” Delta said, his face sour.

“Ah yes. I’d like very much to hear more about _that_ situation.” He gave Delta his best unamused look, though he couldn’t help feeling it wasn’t up to his usual standards. “I went to your funeral, you know.”

“Really?”

“Well, not in person, but I did watch the feed. It was a lovely service. Your pet operatives looked genuinely grief-stricken; it really helped sell the story. And however did you convince Stark to commission that memorial fountain? Not to mention the tribute from Captain America. That was a master touch; everyone was quite convinced.”

Delta winced.

Harry raised his eyebrows. It bloody hurt, so he put them down again. “It was legitimate, then? I was thinking deep cover.”

Delta sighed. “Unfortunately, yes. Things in New York took an… unfortunate turn.”

“Hawkeye and the Black Widow must have been terribly relieved to learn of your miraculous recovery and/or escape, then,” Harry said. The three agents that made up Delta’s strike team had always been unusually devoted to one another—inadvisably so, he’d always thought. He and Delta had argued about it.

A muscle in Delta’s jaw flexed. Death or not, his tells hadn’t changed. A sore subject, then; interesting. Harry wondered if there had been a falling-out.

Ah, well. He wasn’t here to interrogate Delta.

…That he knew of, at any rate. It was never wise to make sweeping pronouncements in their line of work.

“Would you care to tell me why I’m currently…” he glanced around the room, which was unpleasantly damp and poorly-lit in that inherently government-bunker way, “… _here,_ instead of convalescing at my own agency? Not that it isn’t a pleasure to see you again, Delta, but I was on rather urgent business.” It wasn't that he didn’t trust his colleagues to have dealt with whatever undoubtedly overwrought plan Valentine had been hatching; he just hated not being in at the finish.

“You may as well call me Phil,” Delta said, “What with the whole Arlington thing, plus the Hydra leak, it’s not much of a secret anymore.”

“Harry,” he said. “To my friends.”

Delta—Phil—smiled, but his eyes were sad. “I know,” he said. “Merlin told me.”

Harry drew a sharp breath, wincing at the way it made his head pound. _“What?”_ Merlin would never—the situation would had to have been— what in God’s name had _happened?_

“Calm down, Ga—Harry, it’s okay,” Phil said quickly, moving closer and laying a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “It got bad, but things are better now.” He looked conflicted. “I’ve got some files for you to view,” he said. “Merlin gave them to me, for when you woke up. They may be… upsetting, though, and I’d rather wait until the doctors have a chance—”

“Whatever it is, I’m worse off not knowing,” Harry cut in. “I’ll imagine untold horrors, and you know I’ve enough experience to come up with terrifying possibilities. Just let me see whatever Merlin sent, and you can have your medical staff prod me all you like afterward.”

Phil sighed. “All right,” he said, “but I’m staying, and the minute any of those monitors goes into the red zone I’m cutting you off.”

“That’s fair enough,” Harry allowed, and held out his hand—only trembling a little—for the tablet. Already, he was stronger; an encouraging sign.

Merlin had prepared him a mission briefing, slightly adapted to be visible without his glasses, and the familiar format was a comfort; he noticed the hyperlinks within the text that would lead to supplementary footage, supporting documents, and the like. He read through the whole thing once, forcing his breathing to stay even through the series of shocks—the truth of Valentine’s plan, his own apparent death, Arthur’s betrayal, and Eggsy’s splendid renaissance. He was reeling, but careful not to let it show lest Phil decree him too delicate to read more.

There were certain things Harry needed to see for himself. He hesitated over the description of the test at the church, but finally decided that if he was fortunate enough not to remember going into some sort of berserker rage and then being shot, he wouldn’t go seeking the memory.

Arthur, though. He’d been a hidebound old snob, but betrayal? _Genocide?_ The report laid out the facts: Arthur had attempted to talk Eggsy into joining Valentine, Eggsy had refused, Arthur had tried to kill Eggsy; Eggsy had turned the tables, killed him, and recovered the technology and intel that had allowed them to infiltrate Valentine’s base.

It wasn’t that Harry didn’t believe it; it was exactly in character for Eggsy, to find Arthur out but not to agree to his terms. He’d seen true heroism in Eggsy from the beginning, when the boy had tried to save him in that pub, had refused to give Harry up to that odious stepfather of his. He just hadn’t expected it to come so _soon,_ and for the threat to be so close. He had to see the footage for himself.

There were multiple citations for that section—emails, recovered financial records, phone and meeting logs, and the like—but Harry went straight to the video clip. The recovered feed from Arthur’s glasses.

He watched Arthur lead the toast— _his_ toast, which was honestly unsettling to see—and then Eggsy slammed into the Dining Room with eyes full of fire. He watched them talk, watched them drink to him, and then—

He stopped breathing when Arthur held up the pen. He hadn’t even looked down at the glasses while he was slipping the poison in, the canny old devil. Poisoning a _Kingsman’s toast_ , and somehow that made the whole thing even worse. Nothing was sacred, of course, in their line of work, but to use Harry’s own death toast to murder someone—to murder his— _Eggsy_ —was an uncomfortably intimate betrayal.

He listened while Arthur poured his venom into Eggsy’s ear, offering him life, a second chance at Kingsman, the opportunity to carry on Harry’s name: the serpent in the garden, tempting the innocent with bitter wisdom.

And Eggsy met his eyes unflinching, jaw up as though to take a blow, and said, “I’d rather be with Harry, thanks.”

Harry dropped the tablet. He was dimly aware of an alarm sounding, of Phil saying something, but none of that was important just then. What he’d seen—what Eggsy had _said_ —he had never imagined—

He was so preoccupied that he didn’t notice the nurse injecting the sedative into his IV until he felt Phil’s warm, calloused grip easing him back onto his pillows and noticed that everything had gone dim and fuzzy. He tried to grab for the tablet, but missed.

“No,” he slurred, fighting the sedative. “Have to see—”

“Later, Harry,” Phil said, and his voice was so gentle. “You can watch the rest later.”

Harry slept.

>>>————> <————<<<

Phil came back the next day, dressed normally in one of his Italian suits (sadly not bespoke, as apparently SHIELD’s expense vouchers would only stretch so far) and what appeared to be a mechanical prosthetic hand.

“That’s new,” Harry said, blinking at it.

Phil smiled, a little. “We’ve got some good engineers on our team,” he said. “It took a few months, but they got me back in fighting shape. Plus it has built-in lockpicks. And I can inject a tranquilizer out of the pinky. It really comes in—”

“For the love of God,” Harry groaned.

“Handy,” Phil finished, grinning unrepentantly at his own terrible joke.

“You couldn’t have been reincarnated or whatever it was with a better sense of humor?” Harry groused. He didn’t really mean it, though. It was nice to see that some things never changed. Including, apparently, Phil’s devotion to SHIELD; he’d restarted the whole thing after that utter bloody mess at the Triskelion and seemed to be determined to rebuild it personally.

“I hope you don’t expect me to call you Director,” Harry told him. “After what I saw you do in Soho, I’d never be able to keep a straight face.”

“Honestly, I’d much rather you call me Phil,” he said, and he sounded unexpectedly sincere. Harry wondered how many people called him that, anymore.

>>>————> <————<<<

 

It took him eight days to get the tablet back.

“Simmons yelled at me for an hour after the last time,” Phil told him, the fifth time he asked. “No more exertion until she signs off. Want some more Nutritional Supplement Goo? I brought chocolate this time.”

Harry glared at him.

“It tastes better than it looks,” Phil said, waving the little cup at him. There was a spoon stuck in it. It was standing up by itself.

Dr. Simmons, who Harry gathered was actually a biochemist rather than a proper doctor but was in charge of his case for some reason, had put Harry on a rigorous and bizarre rehabilitation regimen that involved an unholy amount of PT and regular mysterious infusions in addition to the aforementioned goo. (It did taste better than it looked—marginally—but that wasn’t saying much.)

He did manage to convince Phil, who was after all an agent himself and understood these things, to get a status update from Merlin on a few key points. He rested easier knowing that Eggsy—who had been given the Galahad title by unanimous vote of the remaining knights after the Valentine affair, a fact which filled Harry with bittersweet emotion—was currently out on mission, current with his status check-ins, and working beautifully in the field with Lancelot. He desperately wanted to speak to him (and possibly, yes, to see for himself that he’d made it through unharmed), but Merlin insisted that the emotional shock of the contact would likely cause Eggsy to blow his cover.

“We’ve all lost too much to risk agents the way we used to, Harry,” he’d said. “Your grand resurrection will be much more satisfying to all concerned if you let yourself heal properly for a bit before shoving yourself on a transatlantic flight to see an agent who won’t even be back at HQ for weeks.”

Harry was fairly certain that Merlin and Phil were conspiring to keep him in SHIELD’s bunker long enough to complete Dr. Simmons’ regimen. However, he was also fairly certain that it was kindly meant, and he still had frequent enough bouts of pain and weakness that he was willing to concede the point for now. Plus, Phil made a lot of time for visits, or at least for working nearby while Harry did his therapy exercises, and it was surprisingly pleasant to spend time with him that involved neither megalomaniacs nor explosions.

“You never did explain why I ended up here rather than at our US HQ,” Harry remarked to him on the third day. He’d been promoted up a level in his therapy and needed something to distract him from how much everything bloody hurt. (He’d only just started recovering that muscle tone from the last time, too. Fucking comas.)

“Fortunate coincidence,” Phil said, not looking up from the three tablets and two file folders he had spread out over Harry’s tray table, which he had commandeered that morning. “We were looking for unidentified Gifted.”

“You and your bloody superhero complex,” Harry said.

“It’s not a complex if it turns out to be true,” Phil said mildly. “Anyway, right after V-Day, things were pretty chaotic here. A lot of hospitals and morgues just started putting photos of their unidentified subjects online, hoping next of kin would turn up. Skye roughed out an algorithm for us, looking for people of interest.”

Harry finished the final set of his arm exercises and set the hand weights down with a clunk, hitting the rest timer. “And what made someone interesting?”

“We looked for people who were the only survivor in a group, or were surprisingly less injured than others found in the same area, that sort of thing,” Phil explained. “Patterns that would indicate either undocumented powers or just people who were well-trained fighters.”

“Did it work?”

“We found three sleeper Hydra agents, four former SHIELD agents who had gone into hiding, a newly manifested telekinetic, and you, so I’d say it was pretty successful, all in all.” Phil studiously didn’t look up from his work. “And it didn’t sit right with me to leave a friend vulnerable like that, so I had my people pick you up. Merlin made contact with us shortly thereafter.”

Harry was fairly certain that it hadn’t been that easy. Phil didn’t appear to have that many “people” anymore, for one thing, and the operation was being pretty obviously run on a shoestring.

“Phil.” He waited until Phil looked up, and met his eyes, trying to put as much sincerity into his words as possible. “Thank you. Truly.”

Phil’s shoulders eased, and he quirked a tired little half-smile. “Well, you know, it was just as much for my benefit,” he said. “I haven’t got so many friends anymore that I can afford to waste any.”

“You mean our old fantasy of faking our deaths and having a long, luxurious retirement in Tahiti wouldn’t have— what’s wrong?”

Phil had gone pale, fingers white around the edges of his tablet. It was fortunate it wasn’t the metal hand, or he might have shattered the screen. “Let’s just say that neither death nor Tahiti is all it’s cracked up to be.”

“A pity.” The rest timer dinged, and Harry moved to start the leg exercises. “I’ve toyed with the thought of just staying dead to everyone but Merlin. It’d be a fantastic cover for delicate work.”

“It is.” Phil didn’t meet his eyes. “But I think that in most cases, a less comprehensive cover could give nearly as much security with less in the way of… unfortunate side effects. You just woke up; people might still forgive you if you tell them soon.”

“Surely people in the business would understand.” It wouldn’t have been for too long; just enough time for Harry to do a good job or two of undercover work. Enough time for Eggsy to get established as an agent, so nobody would perceive anything untoward if he later formed an… internal attachment.

“Maybe.” Phil started gathering up his work. “I think some would see it as a betrayal.” He bundled everything into his battered leather attache. “I’ll see you later, Harry. I’ve got to make some calls.”

“See you then,” Harry said to his retreating back. Perhaps he was right—and it was certainly a important consideration for someone so new to the occupation as Eggsy—but he wondered whether Phil’s opinion was shaped by experience or pessimism. It was a puzzle, and something to take his mind off the PT, which was somehow both boring and excruciating. Something to help keep him from dwelling on what he’d seen in Merlin’s files, on what else might lie inside them.

He wondered whether everyone else working for Phil now was as young as Dr. Simmons. Perhaps if he could track down someone who’d known Phil as Control Delta, he could get some more useful information. It would be something to occupy his mind, at any rate.

The next day, Phil didn’t come by, but someone else did; a woman he’d actually met independently of Phil on a mission in Prague. His target had killed her target, and they’d had to improvise rather explosively to extract themselves from the situation.

“Galahad,” she said, nodding at him as he worked on the series of contortions that were in aid of core stability. “I’m Agent Melinda May.”

He didn’t offer to rise; he normally would, for a lady, but in this situation, they were both agents, which took precedence. “An honor to make your acquaintance,” he said, and if his tone was a bit compressed, they both pretended not to notice. “I’m Harry Hart.”

“Director Coulson asked me to let you know that he’s unavoidably tied up in meetings today,” she said.

Her poker face was amazing, but there was something in her expression, a certain quirk of eyebrow that he thought he remembered. He took a chance.

“Director Coulson is hoping that I’ll forget to press him on topics that make him uncomfortable,” he said, letting his affection and concern color his tone.

She watched him silently for a few more reps. He concentrated on keeping his expression open, letting himself wince a bit. Eventually, something shifted in the room; not anything so blatant as words or even gestures, but there was a certain receptiveness to the silence.

“When I met the Director,” Harry said, between huffs of exertion, “he was going by the callsign Control Delta. He was leading a small strike team—only himself and two other agents. But they were—” he finished the last set and let himself rest on the mat, far too tired, still. “They were legendary.”

“Barton and Romanoff,” Agent May said.

“Hawkeye and the Black Widow,” Harry said. “That was what first intrigued me, when our missions intersected in Lagos, all those years ago. Here were two agents, living legends in the community, and in the third spot on their roster, this man.” His rest timer pinged, and he took the next position, ready to begin again. “No ordinary field agent could keep up with them. So logically, it followed, that either ‘Control’ was a misnomer, and he was never meant to keep up, or that—” he broke off with a huff, muscles straining, and Agent May gave an infinitesimal nod.

“Or that he was anything but ordinary,” she finished for him.

“Indeed.” He finished the set, letting his trembling limbs fall back to the mat for the blessed rest period. “And by the end of my time in Lagos, it was clear which was the case.”

She handed him his water bottle, and he drained half of it in one long pull.

“I’ve worked with many field teams,” he continued, “some of them legendary successes in their own right, but when those three were on their game, they were peerless. It was a joy, frankly, to watch them work, and they took joy in the work and in each other. The rumors about them in the community ranged from saccharine to lurid.”

“My favorite was always the one where Phil was an android, Romanoff was immortal, and Barton was their cyborg love child,” Agent May said, dry as dust.

“Don’t be absurd, Romanoff was obviously the love child,” Harry said, moving to start his next set. “The two of them made over her like broody hens trying to raise a harpy as their chick.” He pulled something wrong, and pain shot through his thigh; he froze, a thin whine escaping his throat.

“Not that you’re calling the Black Widow a harpy, of course,” she said, moving to help him stretch out the offending muscle.

“Of course not,” he managed, sighing a bit as the pain eased. “A siren, sometimes, or a fury perhaps.” He flexed his muscle, making sure the cramp would not return, before going back to his exercises. “But all that is beside the point, which is that your esteemed Director is _here_ , and those two—operatives I once saw set the Danube on fire as a distraction so they could steal the Holy Right Hand of St. Stephen in order to ransom that man back from a blood cult—are elsewhere, and when I inquire as to why, the Director has suddenly remembered a full schedule and cannot possibly speak of it.” The final timer dinged, at last, but he didn’t get up yet; the mat was really quite surprisingly comfortable. “What I cannot help but wonder is whether they have actually cut ties, or whether he is just uncharacteristically afraid that they will, once they discover the truth.”

She regarded him steadily. “Hawkeye and the Black Widow are exclusively Avengers, now,” she said. “They are no longer privy to SHIELD secrets.”

Ah. “It seems a pity to maintain operational distance from such an… exceptional group of people,” he remarked.

“I agree,” Agent May said.

“Perhaps in the future, all our organizations might form a closer understanding.”

She nodded, and Harry thought they understood each other perfectly. “Perhaps,” she said.

Harry could work with that. He liked having a project, after all; it would keep him from dwelling overmuch on the exact content of the Nutritional Supplement Goo. The French vanilla flavor was _not_ a success.

Phil stayed away another day and a half, and then turned up back in Harry’s medical bunker with a bunch of files and a sour expression. Harry didn’t bring up Barton and Romanoff again just yet. He knew the man; he needed time to stew over the whole thing a while longer before he’d be in a good place to be nudged. Instead, he concentrated on the friendship that had always been easy between them, and it was both gratifying and a little saddening how eager Phil was to return it.

Director Coulson seemed to have a lot of devoted protégées, but Phil didn’t have many friends.

>>>————> <————<<<

 

It took the better part of another week for tiny Dr. Simmons to declare him recovered enough to be released into the Director’s care, which consisted primarily of a large amount of bad food and good liquor and the retelling of old war stories until they both fell asleep on Phil’s couch, tilted together like bookends. They slept in the next morning and didn’t make themselves hurry to get up; later, as they smiled at each other, sipping cups of strong coffee on the sofa, Harry curled a hand over Phil’s strong thigh.

“You know,” he said, “here we both are, back from the dead, and we haven’t done anything truly life-affirming yet. What a pity.”

Phil’s leg tensed beneath Harry’s hand, and then he relaxed, all of a piece, and his mouth curled into a slow, seductive grin. “Well,” he said. “Far be it from me to gainsay tradition.”

They’d had a lot of sex over the years, Delta and Galahad, most of it the sort of adrenaline-fueled, passionate trysts that leave one wrung-out and aching and covered with fine scratches and intimate bruising; the sort of sex one has when one is at the peak of one’s physical form and has recently cheated death.

Harry and Phil had a different kind of sex that day.

They started on the sofa, exchanging lazy, coffee-scented kisses for long minutes. Harry had a few new scars on the inside of his mouth, little knots of raised tissue that Phil took his time becoming acquainted with. Phil still liked to nose under the hinge of Harry’s jaw, leaving tiny, nipping kisses on the thin skin there, kisses that would redden but not bruise. Phil was an expert at leaving marks that would be gone by morning.

They moved to the bed soon after, both of them half-hard but in no hurry, skimming out of their clothes to stretch out luxuriously together in the morning sun. They were both of them carrying new scars since last they’d met, most notably their twin death blows and Phil’s hand. Harry’s scar was long and thin down the side of his skull, with a starburst of wounds at his temple and cheekbone where his glasses had shattered on impact. They’d shaved his hair away to treat him, all down the side of his head; he’d have to crop it all short to match before he left. Phil ran gentle flesh fingers over it, a whisper of touch that didn’t irritate the still-healing skin.

“I’m glad we found you, Harry,” he said. “The world’s a better place with you in it.”

Harry smiled at him, drawing a hand in his turn over the gnarled red scar over Phil’s heart. “You always did think first about the world,” he said. “It’s the reason you infuriate those who care for you.” He leaned in, brushing another kiss over Phil’s mouth. “But it’s probably more than half the reason we care for you in the first place, so we learn to live with it.”

Phil snorted a little. “You’re usually too English to exaggerate like that.” He drew Harry closer, running his metal hand over his hip. It was shockingly cool, making Harry’s skin pebble in the wake of his touch. Everywhere else, Phil seemed to run warmer now than in the past; Harry wondered if it was due to whatever mysterious process had brought him back from being quite obviously run through. He let the matter go for the present, throwing a leg over Phil’s hip to nudge their swelling pricks together, making them both quiver. They lay together in the middle of Phil’s bed, sheets crisp and smooth under their naked skin, languorous rolls of their hips building their arousal slowly. Harry reveled in it, familiarity and closeness and gentle heat, the acceptance of an old friend and the caring touch of an old lover. He hadn’t had anything like this in far too long.

“I’d like you to fuck me,” he told Phil, grinning when Phil shoved into his hip with a groan. “My balance still isn’t its best, though, so you’ll need to drive.”

“I think I can manage,” Phil told him, and his muscles bunched deliciously as he heaved them both over, so Harry was on his back with Phil atop him, their legs slotted together. Phil kissed him fiercely before rolling to one side, scrabbling in his bedside table drawer for a condom and lube. He pulled one of his pillows down from the head of the bed and shoved it under Harry’s hips.

Phil had always had clever fingers, and that certainly hadn’t changed in the years since they’d last been together, even now that half of them were artificial; he had an unerring instinct for the way to move to make Harry groan with pleasure, the exact level of friction that felt best, when to stretch and when to caress, when to speed up and when to ease back. By the time Phil reached for the condom, Harry was achingly hard and dripping, his hole loose and wet and eager to be filled.

“Get on with it, you fucking tease,” he managed, his voice considerably less controlled than he would have preferred. Phil just smirked at him, lining up their hips, letting the head of his prick just kiss the rim of Harry’s arsehole. He was lucky that smugness was sexy on him, the bastard.

It was a long slide in, Phil’s prick fat and solid and gorgeous inside him the way it had always been, and Harry shivered from his scalp to the soles of his feet when he got in all the way and started to thrust. Phil put his back into it, face and chest flushed and dewed with sweat—unable, as always, to give any job less than his utmost effort. It seemed like no time at all went by before Harry was spending himself over Phil’s curled knuckles and his own belly in a long glorious rush of sensation, his body clamping down around Phil as he came, too, grinding himself as deep into Harry as he could get.

After, Harry rested his head over the scar on Phil’s chest while the air cooled and their breaths slowed. The strong beat of Phil’s heart under his ear was soothing, and Phil toyed with an unshorn lock of Harry’s hair, pulling it through his fingers and letting it spring back, the curl coming through from the dampness of sweat.

“I’m starting to go grey,” Harry said. “When we first met, I thought I’d be blown up before that happened.”

“You’re too good to be blown up that easily,” Phil murmured. “And at least you’ve still _got_ your hair.”

Harry scoffed. “With a prick like yours, Delta, you don’t _need_ hair,” he said.

“Yes, because I get all my dates through the medium of the dick pic.” Harry didn’t need to look to picture the look on Phil’s face, a mix of skepticism and uncertain pleasure. He didn’t take complements very well, at least not personal ones, and he never had.

“Photographs are hardly necessary for the discerning,” he said airily. “At least not if the looks your Agent Barton always used to steal were any indicator.”

“He’s not _my_ —what looks?”

“You can’t tell me you never noticed. He watched you like a starving dog eyeing the last chop in the butcher’s window.”

Phil poked him. “Don’t be ridiculous. I was his handler, he looked to me for operational intel.”

Harry laughed, loud and sharp. “I’ve had lots of handlers in my career—including attractive ones, close friends, and some that were both—and I never looked at any of them like _that._ Lie to yourself if you must, but do me the courtesy of trusting my eyes.”

“So I suppose if I bring up the number of times you’ve re-watched certain video files—”

“Don’t try to change the subject,” Harry interrupted. “I’m well aware that Eggsy and I have unfinished business between us. The only reason I haven’t spoken to him yet is that he’s on mission, whereas you’ve been treating two of your most important people as though they didn’t matter. It isn’t like you.”

Phil’s fingers tightened in Harry’s hair. “You just waited until now to come out with this so I couldn’t avoid the conversation, didn’t you.”

“A Kingsman uses the tools at his disposal,” Harry said. He brushed a kiss over the scar beneath his head. “I don’t like to see you like this. You may be in charge, now, but that doesn’t mean you can’t find some peace for yourself.”

“I have a responsibility to him,” Phil said. “To protect him, even from myself. Especially from myself. That doesn’t go away because I’m in charge.”

“What precisely does Agent Barton need protection from that Agent May does not?”

He could feel Phil flinch beneath his hands. “From me,” he said, his words dragging out of him like hooks. “I could hurt Clint in ways I could never in a million years hurt Melinda, and the worst part is, he’d let me. What happened to me—what was _done_ to me—I’ve been compromised, Harry, and it’s only very recently that I’ve been able to trust myself again. I couldn’t bring that trouble to his door.”

That wasn’t really an explanation, but Harry let it go; he could feel Phil’s tension building and he didn’t want to push him far enough to stop talking entirely. The great thing about Phil was that sometimes, if you planted a seed, he’d do the cultivation himself; he was terrible at letting things go, the poor bastard.

Harry let himself stroke Phil’s shoulder, holding back a sigh. “But you do trust yourself now.”

“Years later? When you turn up at your HQ, it will be different. ‘It’s a miracle! Harry’s alive after all!’ For me to show my face now, after so many years, after he—after my friends have had time to do whatever mourning they had to do and move on with their lives… it wouldn’t just be insensitive, it would be cruel.”

“What you’re doing now is cruel to yourself,” Harry said. “Living in this perpetual uncertainty. You might be rejected, true, but you might _not_ be. Would it not be better to know? In the worst case, your dear ones reject you, and you are no worse off than today. Otherwise…” Harry shrugged. “Perhaps you get another chance.”

Phil was silent for a long time. “You aren’t going to let this go, are you?” he asked at last.

“I am renowned for my persistence,” Harry observed. “It has been particularly noted in my quarterly reviews.”

Phil sighed. “I’ll think about it,” he allowed, begrudging.

“That’s all I ask,” Harry told him, and then kissed and petted him into a better temper before lunch.

>>>————> <————<<<

Harry had perhaps had too much time on his hands during his convalescence, because he had dreamed up dozens of fanciful plans for how he would let Eggsy know he was still alive. Most of them involved headquarters or the tailor shop, a few Harry’s own home, and one or two involved bouquets of flowers and handwritten signs and a shocking amount of sentimentality that Harry put down to the medication; but when Merlin mentioned that Eggsy and Roxy had just completed a mission with two Avengers and the four of them were staying in town for a few days in case further action was required, he tossed those plans out without a second thought and went straight to Agent May. Soon, the transport had been all arranged; Agent May would take him on one of SHIELD’s cunning little VTOL jets. They didn’t mention to Phil that there would be anyone at their destination besides Eggsy and Roxy.

“Come with me,” Harry asked Phil. “Please? I’d like to introduce you to them.”

Phil agreed, of course, because underneath the bureaucrat persona he’d always been softhearted. It made Harry even more sure that this course of action was correct; Phil would worry at the problem forever if left to himself.

One of Phil’s men lent Harry a set of clippers and he evened out his hair, mourning it a little; having it this short made him look older, ill. It couldn’t be helped, though, and at least it would grow back in time. At least Harry was alive to grow it.

Most of Harry’s personal effects had been sadly destroyed or confiscated by civilian police and medical personnel in the immediate aftermath of V-Day, but Phil and Merlin had somehow conspired amongst themselves to have some of Harry’s own clothes shipped over, and Phil made him a present of a handsome and sturdy walking-stick, complete with a poisoned blade and bug detector, useful in many situations even after Harry’s lingering balance troubles resolved.

The trip was only about a half-hour, and Harry spent most of that time attempting not to fidget; it was embarrassing, honestly. At his age. Phil noticed the way Harry was running his fingers over and over the handle of his new stick and smirked at him, insufferably. Harry scowled at him. He was feeling less and less guilty over tricking Phil into coming along.

They landed just outside of town; Agent May had arranged a car and drove them to the hotel where their agents were enjoying the benefits of a Stark Industries expense account. The four of them should be in the hotel bar, waiting to meet a courier who was bringing them additional intelligence; Merlin had come through splendidly, though he rolled his eyes so much at Harry’s surprise plan that it was surprising the man hadn’t strained something.

He heard them before he saw them, a burst of exuberant laughter that rose above the ambient noise for a moment before being cut off. It made him smile, and hurry his steps as much as he could. He hardly needed the cane at all for walking anymore; it was really more a prop against the occasional wave of vertigo.

Harry rounded a corner and there was their quarry, sitting at one of the high round tables in the bar. Agent Barton was facing him, with Agent Romanoff to his right and young Roxy to his left; Eggsy was opposite, his back to Harry but unmistakeable even so. Harry stopped walking, leaned on his cane, and just looked, letting the moment stretch out, anticipation and possibility. Phil came around the corner and skidded to a halt, body stiffening as he looked at the table; he made a sharp, bitten-off sound.

Agent Barton looked up, and dropped his drink with a crash, face gone blank with shock. The others swung around in their seats, hands already reaching for weapons.

Eggsy turned, and Harry saw every moment of emotion sweeping over his expressive face like wind on a field of grain: shock, disbelief, and dawning joy. And then Eggsy planted one strong hand on the back of his chair and _vaulted_ , knocking it over with a clatter and propelling himself straight to—”

“ _Harry,_ ” Eggsy said, his beautiful voice breaking, as he fetched up right before Harry, reaching out with a trembling hand but stopping just before he made contact, as though he were afraid that even now, he wouldn’t be permitted to touch.

Fuck propriety and all of Harry’s plans; he wouldn’t—he _couldn’t_ —leave Eggsy hanging like that, uncertain of his welcome. Harry closed the distance, wrapping his free arm around Eggsy’s shoulders and pulling him close; Eggsy shivered all over and buried his face in Harry’s tie, clinging to him and cursing him.

He knew, distantly, that Roxy and Agent May were clearing the room. He thought he saw Agents Barton and Romanoff herding Phil off somewhere, her face set and pale, his like a thunderstorm breaking. But none of that mattered, just at the moment; all Harry’s attention was narrowed to the the brush of Eggsy’s hair along his jaw, the way Eggsy’s shoulders were heaving under his hands as he took great sobbing breaths between calling Harry every obscene name he could think of. He’d obviously been paying attention in his languages training.

He stayed there as long as he could, but adrenaline still took him oddly sometimes, and he found himself swaying as a sickening wave of vertigo hit. Eggsy cut himself off mid-insult, eyes huge in his pale face, and Harry found himself being pushed into a chair.

“Shit, what’s wrong? Did I hurt you? Fuck, I shouldn’t—here, do you want some water? Have some water, it—no, take this one, nobody drank this one.” Eggsy was practically babbling, looking anxiously at Harry, his eyes flicking to the side where the scarring was, pushing a glass of water at him like a lifeline. His lips were trembling. His eyes were overbright.

 _My precious boy,_ Harry thought, but it would be unseemly to take advantage of the first tempestuous moments of Eggsy’s joy, so he simply looked at him, and smiled.

“Hello, Eggsy.”

**Author's Note:**

> Next up: Double Fix-it all across the sky- so intense!


End file.
